Throughout human history, many traditions and customs have developed along various human tribes and cultures in response to changes in the natural world. Changes all humans could observe but not really explain.

Our ancestors, not possessing the technological and scientific knowledge that we posses today – and which allow us to analyze and understand what we observe – created a world filled with deities, myths and legends in order to rationalize the world around them.

The changes in the seasons and thus the cycle of life – from the fruitful and warm months of the spring and summer, to the dark, frigid and cold months of the fall and winter, are one such example.

Use of Symbolism in Religion

The use of symbolism in religion is a universally established phenomenon. Archeologist Steven Mithen contends that it is common for religious practices to involve the creation of images and symbols to represent supernatural beings…

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“Obviously, Jesus intended to replace the Passover with a yearly serving of this memorial meal.”

Uhm….that WAS the Passover. “How earnestly I have desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer.” The bread and wine were elements of the historical Passover meal.

As far as the celebration of Easter by Christians is concerned….it’s obviously quite ridiculous and inane to try and interpret pagan rituals as somehow referencing Jesus. However, I’m not sure how you’re arguing that participating in a secular tradition that happens to have pagan roots is equivalent to practicing that pagan religion. Care to explain?

As always, thanks for commenting. Remembering that I didn’t write the post, I had to read your comment a couple of times. I’m not sure how you missed it. The practice of pagan ritual is verboten in the Christian bible.

“These things, however, have everything to do with the ancient pagan traditions of Babylon and Mesopotamia. Engaging in such activities makes professing Christians nothing but idolaters. ”
— http://www.openbible.info/topics/idolatry

The bible is pretty clear, don’t do that shit. Only do the shit that I tell you to do, anything else is a ticket to hell. This is why, in part, many devout theists think that Halloween is Satanic. Yet, they make idols of all kinds for their supposed Christian holidays.

It does not matter the technicality of whether the Christian is worshipping the idol, the rule was to not make them. Don’t even pretend. Don’t hang around with people who do. Don’t even look like you might be making idols. It’s really bad and skydaddy will make you burn. No dancing, no rock music, no long hair… and so on.

Turns out, Easter is all about idols and gods that are not YHWH or Jesus. All these traditions for supposed Christian holidays are pagan. The Christian bible is pretty clear about it: Don’t do that.

Where do you expect the line to be drawn? There’s a lot of stuff that can be connected to paganism in some way. Hell, even the names of the week are based on ancient deities.

If I understand the argument properly, it’s saying, “Christians can’t do such-and-such if they want to be consistent.” But to my knowledge, the Bible never decried secular practices simply because they had a connection to paganism. So what’s your basis for saying that something like a Christmas tree (which has been totally divorced from paganism in the public mind) is inconsistent?

So, Christians would have to have metal statues of BAAL before it would be a violation of the teachings in their book?

I personally don’t expect a line. It’s lines like that which prevent theists from accepting the reality that their deity does not exist and causes them to be caustic to others and society on the whole.

The question of Easter being a Christian holiday is answered in the fact that claiming it to be a Christian holiday is a false claim. Passover is Jewish. I see it as okay to use that to celebrate the death of their deity. Appropriating a secular or pagan holiday and its fetishes and claiming them as their own is what the book says not to do. A ‘bible believing Christian’ shouldn’t be buying chocolate bunnies and coloring eggs… according to the book.

Do I think it fine to criticize them for how they run their religion? Yes. When their book is used to try to claim that GLBTQ citizens should be denied equal rights then society gets to use that book against said people. If they want to claim privilege because of a book then they need to be following that book, not cherry picking in order to garner unwarranted position or privilege.

The argument being that they should not be granted privilege based on their belief, and their belief should not be codified into law. These people will clearly pick and choose whatever they want to get their way. The wilfully ignore the law of their deity, they should not be given ability to create law for the rest of us based on their beliefs.

the point is that Easter is a Pagan tradition. So for all those celebrating it as one of the holiest months in the Christian faith, it is important to realize that there is nothing Christian about it and that Easter has Pagan origins. So if you gonna celebrate it be aware that – much like Christmas – Easter has nothing to do with Jesus. In fact, nowhere in the Bible is Easter mentioned and using Pagan symbols and traditions (such as cross buns, easter sunrise, eggs and rabbits etc) is not allowed according to your own god damn god.

I don’t know if I told you already, but here is a link to a file that may interest you, it’s a book by Sītā Rām Goyal “Jesus Christ: An Artifice for Aggression”. It’s not specifically about Easter, but it is about why Christianity is made-up crap.